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Tuesday, November 4

Read This...

So, I work at a bookstore (aka The Mother Ship). Yes, it is a minimum wage job, but it is also the BEST job I have ever had (even better than being Shamu at Sea World (no joke, I was Shamu at Sea World.)). First of all, I love books. And second of all, I love bookstores. And third of all, I like helping people. And fourth of all....wait. There is no fourth of all. Anyways, it's a great job and I love spending all day surrounded by books.

From my time as a "bookseller", I have come to realize that there are a lot of different types of people that visit the bookstore. First, you have the Browsers. There is a man who comes to the bookstore every single day and spends at least two or three hours just browsing around. I've never actually seen him buy anything, but he is there EVERY day. Other people don't really have a certain book in mind, so they wander around, maybe they buy something, maybe they don't.

Then, of course, you have the Person On A Mission - they have a specific book in mind so they are in and out in about 5 minutes flat. They will not be swayed from their goal and they are not interested in looking around.

There are the people who have a book in mind, however they do not know the title or the author - all they know is what it is about. So you then spend about 15 minutes doing a keyword search in the computer, trying to figure out what book they are looking for. Sometimes you are successful and sometimes not so much.

There are other types of people, but the one I want to especially mention is the Reader. The Reader is the person who comes into the bookstore very frequently (sometimes every day, or every weekend) to read. Just to read. Never to buy. They take the book of the shelf and settle into one of the big comfy armchairs and read. For hours, they read. And after they finish the book (it usually takes a couple of visits), they put it back on the shelf or leave it on the table and they start into another book. And they read. But they never make a purchase. Ever. I know of two specific guys who come into the store and do this. The one guy comes on the weekends and he will read for hours, sometimes until we close at 11:00pm. He finished Brisingr after a couple of visits, and then he started another book the next weekend. For some reason I feel like these Readers are stealing. I don't know why, but they are. We are not a library. We are a bookstore, emphasis on STORE. We provide a good and you purchase the good and enjoy it at your leisure. You shouldn't be allowed to consume the good without compensating for it in the form of a payment. I can understand if someone wants to sit down and read the first chapter of a book to make sure they will like it or not, but not the entire book. Enjoy the book, but please, pay for it before you do.

However, the funny thing about the Readers, or rather, one Reader in particular - for the past week or so, I have noticed this guy who has come into the bookstore to read books and let's just say he is quite attractive. He's probably mid-20's, blondish hair, tall, athletic build (and for those who know me really well - he has one of those things that I like that I know I shouldn't like and by no means do I condone them, but I still like them...anyways, he has one). And of course, me being me, I have imagined an entire relationship with this Reader that I don't even know. In my head, I have written our "love at first sight" story - he came into the bookstore, noticed me, but was too shy to talk to me, so he kept on coming back to read so he could see me, and he finally gets up the nerve to talk to me, asking me for a suggestion of a book to read, we get to know each other, turns out he's LDS (of course!), he keeps coming into the bookstore and of course he annoys me at first because he teases me relentlessly, we start dating, we really like each other, there's some drama with a misunderstanding concerning an ex-girlfriend, we work through the drama, we fall in love, we get married and live happily ever after! And it all started in the bookstore!!!

Sigh. It's a little pathetic but also loads of fun, because, hey! I work in a bookstore, surrounded by FICTION. It was bound to rub off sooner or later...